The Kayak Turned Over and There Went My Camera

Thursday November 5, 2015 Jenner CA.

Breeching the mouth again

I make it down to Jenner and put my boat in the water and headed down along the island, headed towards the mouth as I could see the excavator down that way and it looked like he already breeched the closed river’s mouth again and was just leaving.

The ocean was a lot calmer today so they could do a proper breeching job. The other day when they breeched the mouth, waves were sometimes breaking on the excavator so it was hard to safely do a good job

I saw Ray and his brother John’s trucks in the parking lot and knew they were likely down by the mouth somewhere so headed on down that way, going by this loon, which was diving, fishing away.

Ray and John

I found Ray and his brother shooting the bull just in front of the excavator as it was leaving.

I joined them shooting the bull and then we paddled over to the still flooded Penny Island and paddled into the island as far as we could go and just sat around enjoying the day.

Returning the big redwood board

When we left that spot, they went up the back channel of the island and I went over to pick up the big redwood board here to take it over to the visitor center to give to the state park guys that were working on the roof.

It was an easy tow across the river to the center, where they were working on the roof.

I pulled in here with the board and turned it over to them, which they tied up. I’m not sure they wanted it or not, but they got it.

Time for a walk

I met up with Ray and his brother at the upper end of Penny Island and we continued up the river a little ways more to a place I call Telescope as I knew we could pull our boats to shore there.With the water still up, there aren’t many places to get to shore right now and I knew this was the only place on this side of the river. With the water real high, we had some troubles getting our boats out, but we made it and started up the Poison Oak Alley trail about a quarter mile below Eagle’s landing where we wanted to hike up the hill to the top.

Here we are just approaching Eagle’s landing on the trail. Lots of poison oak on this trail, although a lot of it is dormant right now.

We followed an animal path I know about and headed straight up the hill to here were we stopped for a break before continuing on up the hill. This is looking up the river to Bridge Haven. Those black things that look like they are on the water are crows flying into the tree down that way.

Shooting the bull

We continued on up to the top of the hill  where I gave them a choice of which way to go. Ray decided he wanted to head back down to Lookout Point, so after a good rest and a lot more bull, we headed down the trail that is on an old road right in the middle of this picture. This is a place you have to know where you are going to get anywhere as most of the trails aren’t well defined.

I’m following John as we make our way down the trail.

Jenner

The trail pops out here just above Lookout Point which has a nice view of Penny Island and the town of Jenner.

We sat at Lookout point for awhile and then worked our way back down the hill to Eagle’s landing going through these big trees. You can see Ray down there to the right.

Hard to get the boats back in the water

We walked back down Poison Oak Alley trail to our boats. The Mouth had opened during the low tide while we were up the hill, so now the water level had dropped about three feet. John was first to put his boat in the water and he went down a rather steep place. I watched him and decided to try another spot, less steep.

Here’s John at the spot we had to put our boats back in the water, down a three foot mud bank.

Tipped the boat over and sunk my camera

So, I start down the mud bank in my boat, and when I hit the water my boat hit a big stick and turned over and I was under the boat with my feet still in the cockpit and unfortunately, my pack was under water with my non water proof camera in. I pulled my legs out and surfaced laughing, grabbing my pack off the boat with my camera in it. I took the camera out and handed it to Ray. Meanwhile, the bottom was real muddy and I was having a hard time just standing up in the two feet of water, trying to slide in deeper. I told Ray to remove the battery from the camera and see what water he could shake out of it. Fortunately, that was my good backup camera and not my best one. That makes two camera’s I’ve lost that way in the last fourteen years or so.

How to get the water out

Of course, now I had a boat full of water and didn’t seem to have a towel to get the water out, but Ray offered me his beach towel he uses to sit on and I begun getting the water out of the boat, still slipping in the mud.

How to get back in the boat

The next problem was how to get back in the boat without turning over again. I did a back entry where you stand in the water and pull the boat back under your legs until you can fall into the boat. I wasn’t sure I was going to make it, but Ray caught the back of my boat and stabilized it so I had a chance to fall into the cockpit. He handed me my camera and he decided he’d enter the way John did and made it without a mishap like I did.

I was a bit on the wet side, but not cold, so we headed on in to the boat ramp where we took our boats out and went on home.

One last look at the opened river’s mouth

But as I as leaving the parking lot, I decided to drive down to the overlook on highway one that looks out over the mouth area to get a picture of what the river’s mouth looks like when it really gets opened up. I still had my small waterproof Canon point and shoot, so I took this picture of the just opened mouth. Note all the sand piles are gone now and the river is flowing fast out the open mouth and dropping the water level in the estuary fast.

Tried to save the camera

Our weather is pretty nice here, so I didn’t get cold, but I was a bit on the wet side. When I got home, I blew my camera out with air, then heated my little oven to 212 degrees F. and put the camera in it for thirty minutes. That temperature is high enough to evaporate the water, but not hot enough to melt anything. There was lots of water droplets I could see inside on the lens, so I’m not sure how or if it will be any good. I will eventually put the battery back in it and see if it will work.

I decided to cook a whole duck I had thawed out, so I heated up the Webber and put the duck in it on high which was a big mistake as when I checked on it, my duck was all black and not looking too good. :O) I found it and turned the heat down and tried to rescue it. I was able to get past some of the black and eat some of it. I guess I learned something from that. :O)

That was my day.